Posted by James Gibbon on
URL: https://www.shado-forum.com/Let-s-talk-GRAVITY-tp1505098p1505149.html

On Mon, 31 Jan 2005 23:34:36 +0100 (CET)
Karl Heidenreich <[hidden email]> wrote:


> As a matter of fact gravity on the moon is 1/6th of the Earth. But
> it's still gravity. A cat or a dog can weight less than a 1/6th of a
> grown man like Foster here on Earth and still they walk, jump and do
> whatever they do without the danger of finding themselves en route out
> of the atmosphere.

Right - but their body strength is roughly proportional to their
weight, in other words - a dog with 1/6 of the weight of a human
doesn't have human strength in its leg muscles.

> The difference of gravity doesn't seem to give humans a special
> capavility but to do longer or higher jumps as those seen on TV
> by the Apollo crews.

I think it does! The Apollo crews probably wanted to avoid
performing spectacular jumps on the Moon to avoid damage to
their suits, but I'm pretty sure the same force required to
jump 1 foot into the air on Earth would provide roughly a 6
foot jump on the Moon. Possibly even very slightly more, since
there's no air resistance there.

Of course it may be that it's not possible to jump 1 foot into
the air on Earth in a bulky spacesuit such as those worn by
the Apollo crews on the Moon anyway.